Virus

Two

The old man in the front, who reminded me of Einstein, speed onto Nob Hill, the ghetto of Yakima. I saw people shooting at other people with shotguns, or beating them.

The girl opened the back sunroof and began shooting at people who aimed their guns at the van, which was the color of wet cement.

One white man with a roll of pot hanging out of his lips, fired his pistol right though the windshield, shattering it and sending shards of sharp glass at me. The shard sliced at my face and arms. One big piece even stick in my skin right below my collar bone.

I yelped in fear and pain as Einstein hit the man head-on with the van, a drove straight over him. I cringed at the sounds of snapping bones and screaming.

The girl above cleared one of the yards of a tall Victorian home.

"Come on!" I girl screamed at me as she lowered herself from the widow.

She swung open the door and I followed her into the battle.

When we reached the porch, the girl banged on the door. "Travis, it's Sara!" She screamed over the noises of war.

Right as a burly looking Asian man opened the door, the window next to us exploded as a bullet passed through it.

I screamed and Travis shoved me into the house, slamming the door behind us.

"What the Hell is going on out there?" I demanded.

"Well since total Hell has erupted and there's not enough Law Enforcement to stop it, everyone in Yakima took advantage of the opportunity and started killing people they didn't like. And here in the ghetto, everyone has connections, so when the killing started, the place turned into a war zone."

"There's no time to talk!" Travis snapped. "Let's grab the bags and go."

Sara led us down a long hallway and into a garage. The back wall was packed with duffle bags.

I strung three bags over each shoulder, one around my neck, and two in each hand. Travis could carry twice as many as me. Sara carried the last two over her arms, keeping her hands free so she could cover us.

Travis held my arms with his free hand so that we could go faster.

Outside Einstein and the teenage boy were gunning people down with automatic rifles. They assisted Sara in covering us as we stumbled to the van. The boy swung the back door open and we jumped in. Sara slammed the door closed behind us and Einstein took off. We zoomed through the streets, going as fast as possible until we reached a highway.

I noted how precise and planned the route was.

"Where are we going?"

"Topeka. My brother sent us a message saying they had a built a safe city in Topeka."

"We are traveling to Kansas?" I demanded? "Hal is not fit to travel that far."

"Relax," the boy said. "He's just asleep.he got hit by a falling shelf and got knocked out. We dragged him out of there. He's just knocked out."

I sighed with relief. "So who are you and why'd you save me?"

"I wouldn't ask so many questions and be grateful." Sara sneered.

"Sara be polite, she deserves an explanation!" Einstein snapped. "My name is Gary. This is Michael," he gestures to the boy next to him. "That's Sara and Travis back with you."

"So," Sara said, spitting her words at me as if they were venom, "who are you?"

"Kelly Movlid."

"Anyway," Gary continued, "We rescued Hal as the roof was coming down and he asked us to save you before he got knocked out."

Overhead, three helicopters and six jets zoomed by, searching the wide expanse of forest around us. It was a miracle the helicopters light missed us.

Gary quickly turned the van off before they could notice the lights.

We sat in silence until the deafening roar of the engines faded away. Then he started the van and we continued driving.

By the time the sun rose on the third day of driving, we reached Idaho. Reports on the radio, coming from Topeka, say that Mick Holler had captured everything to the west of Idaho, Utah and Arizona. We were right in his territory.

Idaho was crawling with military presence. We take at least fifty detours in the first hour, trying to avoid and group or soldiers of a tank.

We were driving along another vacant highway when a camouflage Humvee comes rumble behind us.

"Please stop the vehicle or we will gun you down!" A voice hollered through a megaphone.

Gary grabbed his pistol off the center console and Michael armed himself with his automatic. Sara began pumping her shotgun and Travis pulled a bow off the floor. Weird to be that medieval in such a modern battle. I realize I am the only one unarmed.

Gary hands me his automatic. I hold the gun awkwardly with two hands and stare at it as if it just tried to kill me.

"All you do is aim and fire," Gary said encouragingly. "Can't be that hard."

Two big burly men dressed in big camouflage pants and green T-shirts. I note the pistols holstered at their belts and the knives hidden in their belts. I don't even know how or why I noticed this so quickly.

"Step out of the car." Apparently there was still another soldier in the Humvee because the voice still came from a megaphone. Maybe there were more.

Just as panic rose inside me, I swallowed it down and focused. These men weren't army trained. They didn't have their firearms our, or even have their hands ready to grab it if needed l. They were rookies, probably recruited from some police force. I also caught the slight stumble in their walk. So slight you wouldn't notice if...well I don't really know why you would or wouldn't notice. The point is that they were fresh and probably easy to take down.

How was my brain noticing and calculating all this?

Just as the reached the van. Gary opened the door, jumped out, and shot one of them in the head. The other let out a startled cry as Travis jumped out and cracked his neck. Chills ran though my body at the sound of the bone. It reminded me of the battle back on Nob Hill. My entire body shudder with one quick tremor.

Sara hopped out after Travis and fired a round strains through windshield of the Humvee. Three more soldiers jumped out and began firing pistols at us. They didn't even have military grade weapons. How was Holler's army strong enough to conquer the west side of the country? This was absurd.

Michael and I jumped out of the other side of the van and began firing. Within seconds, three bloody bodies laid on the pavement, riddled with bullets.

All five of us ran forward, quickly but cautious, toward the Humvee.

I was the jest to see the slight movement inside the cab. I raised my gun and swung the door open.

A little girl sat on the floor, covered in bruises and her eyes were puffy with tears.

"Jasmine," I murmured so quietly, only she heard.

"Aunt Kelly," she whimpered, throwing her arms around me.